this post was submitted on 21 Dec 2025
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Cost doesn’t seem to matter with return fraud. I recently received a “new” $6 item that had its contents replaced with a $4 item and then taped shut. Seriously, who wastes their time on this stuff?
Probably the same people running Pokémon card hustles. I recently saw a guy acting all pissy he had to wait in line at target to buy some packs, started berating the workers “you work at target, you’re broke as fuck”. The workers actually went in on him, I was so happy to see it. They made fun of him for trying to hustle over cards for children and told him to go home and cry to his mom about it.
That’s the kind of loser wasting their time on 2-5 dollar profit per return.
If your time is worthless to you and everyone else, that profit margin can be very tempting. Sounds like a symptom of a serious problem to me though.
Please sir, do you have a link.
I’ll see if I can find it later
Edit: found it
https://old.reddit.com/r/PublicFreakout/comments/1phew1b/scalper_argues_with_target_workers/
Thanks, appreciate it
have you seen r/pokeinvesting, or r/pokecollecting. so sad losers of adults, they arnt even collecting because they play it, its to flip it. all TCPI/TPJ have to do is increase the pull rates, and increase printing of the cards, or have the ability to buy the individual cards on a official shop, instead of issuing RARE CARDS ON stupid events with a limited number and time, and location. instead they are just trying to limit how often its being bought.
opening/buying them is one thing(steamings do this kind of asmr thing).
Keep in mind, whenever you think too hard about these sorts of things, this is one of those operations that could apply to Hanlon’s Razor: “Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.” Many people make the incorrect assumption of something like, “They must have done some clever supply-chain wizardry," or “There’s a smart cost-reduction plan behind this.” When in reality, a lot of times, the actual explanation is something like a mid-level manager wanted a slide that said “cost savings," then procurement was pressured due to some personality ego problem, engineering objections were ignored, the math was never checked, and in the end, nobody involved actually understood unit economics. Maybe exchanging a $6 part for a $4 looks good in volume, but they only did this 20 times, resulting in $40 of savings which was erased by their reputation and incompetence.
I have worked government contracts. I have worked with shitty project managers. There's a lot more of these mistakes than you realize powering economies.
Maybe I haven't understood your point but it sounds like you're describing people both acting maliciously and being stupid about it, so I don't see it as a case of Hanlon's razor.
Exchanging the item for another one that's cheaper, even if it's only $6 total, is still dishonest. The fact that it may not even be worth it for them in the end doesn't change the fact it was an attempt to mislead. They were listing a product, and delivered another one.
I hate that saying. It's not a law. It's a funny quote. Absolutely do not base any judgment you make on it.
@tomiant @punkwalrus Applied to interactions between strangers, "Hanlon's Razor" is a recipe for getting scammed.
Find a $2 scam you can pull hundreds of times a day and you’re a third world billionaire.
Volume and slavery.